Nail trends of 2016 – Shattered Glass Nails

Now generally speaking, I am not a massive fan of nail art, some of it is painstakingly fiddly stuff to achieve and for the every woman, not always ideal in a manicure routine. I am not having a Debbie downer on nail art I promise. I just think maybe the last few nail crazes haven’t really been my cup of tea. Bubble nails anyone? I rest my case.

However, one look that has been really catching my eye on Instagram and polish blogs within the last few months is the Shattered Glass Nails style.

This is definitely a nail style that brings new dimension to the 3D looks that have been popular the last few years. I feel this look is a much more wearable style for everyday manicures.

Originating from Seoul in South Korea, Park Eun Kyung from Unistella Salon, came up with this original look. She said she took inspiration by the shell of a Sea Snail. To create her nail look, she initially used sweet wrappers for the thin shimmery cellophane used in the almost mirror like shatters, which she carefully cut and pieced together on the nail to create the look.

Park Eun Kyung, the originator of the Shattered Glass Nail

However, later on she found a Rainbow cellophane film, which worked better! She decided to use this instead for her skilfully cut geometric shapes, to delicately place on the nail. The film works much better for this use, as it sits flat to the nail and doesn’t lift with wear and tear.

After posting her shattered nail manicures on Instagram she gained 79,000 followers (and counting) and inspired a whole arm of polishaholics to try her manicure. Korea’s largest cosmetic brand decided to work with Park, and came up with Modi x Unistella PRE-CUT shattered glass stickers to achieve her look at home. She became that insta-famous!

I think the main reason I love this look is that every nail is completely unique and you can really make the look your own and tailor it to your own nail art skill set. Also you don’t even need to get your nail art brushes out for this look.

Just head down to your local arts and crafts store, pick up some cellophane that takes your fancy, get cutting and away you go!

In case you wanted to recreate this look at home, the look is layered up in this order: basecoat, nail polish, stickers or film and topcoat. Pick whichever hue of polish colour you want underneath. With the cellophane fairly transparent and holographic, it beautifully takes on the undertones of your chosen shade!

Shattered Glass Nail Inspiration

I love the lighter manicures with this look, they give an ethereal and modern edge to the manicures, and with the lighter tones in the polish and film are quite feminine.

I also love the style of the more facetted designs, this is where you would have to be more precise with cutting your cellophane. A bit trickier to do, but the look is so effective.

Also for a more modern and futuristic looks, you could layer the film multiple times, which gives an almost optical illusion of colour, flashing different colours as the light hit’s it. Beautiful!

You could even use a foil or mirrored cellophane to give an almost dark shell appearance and change the look. Mix up the different materials and overlay a holographic topper to really it change and switch it up a gear.

If doing a whole nail looks to arduous, you could try negative spacing and do a small section of the nail with the shattered glass look. This seems to be quite popular.

Or you could do larger pieces of film in triangular shapes, arrange on the nail and using a dotting tool add metallic silver or gold dots. Or even gems. So pretty!

If you didn’t have time to sit down at come up with a look, you could try adding a sprinkle of iridescent shimmer in topper form. Your own nod to the look!

This look I will definitely try in future, I have everything to do this but the cellophane. I will have to pick some up and give it a try!

In the meantime, I had an idea for a similar look using my favourite dark purple Grosvenor Crescent from Nails Inc with their Hereford Square topper.

This topper has small holographic and iridescent flakes that look like tiny shatters of shell. My own nod to the look which I can definitely see going on my toes!

Have you tried the Shattered Nails Trend? What do you think of the nail trend? Let me know in the Comments down below.